Volker
“And you didn’t know about this, Volker?”
I turn to my commanding officer with a frown that conveys the gravity with which I’m taking this matter. On the inside I am brimming with spiteful glee. It’s been a most satisfying morning. “Nein, Herr Oberst. Hauptmann Heydrich did not see fit to bring his information about the tunnel to me.” I flick my eyes up at Heydrich, who is standing to attention before us both and facing the Oberst. “As he knows he should have.”
Lounging to one side of the Oberst’s desk I have the perfect view of Heydrich’s whey-colored profile. He mutters something about not having had enough time. I’m sure that’s a lie. What motivated him to try and show me up? Angling for early promotion, I presume, by trying to prove that he can flush out traitors as successfully as I do. I’ll enjoy keeping him right where he is, a lowly captain, for the rest of my career.
The Oberst folds his hand over his stomach. He should really get himself out from behind that desk more often. “Hauptmann Heydrich, I am sure I do not need to tell you what a farce the raid was. Three border guards were killed.”
“Such a sad loss of life,” I murmur, reaching for my cigarettes. I wonder what Evony Daumler looks like under those worn-out clothes. I picture her with her long curls brushed out, sliding silk stockings up her legs. Yes, for all that she’s a traitor she’s a very pretty young woman. I don’t like her being out there in the city without me but in addition to the guard that she can see there are four plainclothes officers tailing her. That should be enough to keep an eye on a slippery little rat such as her.
“Four dissidents were shot dead, three are in prison and another five to seven are unaccounted for. We don’t know how many for sure. Could they have escaped back into East Berlin?”
“Ja, Herr Oberst.”
“Or could they have escaped down the tunnel to the West?”
Hauptmann Heydrich winces. “Ja…it’s possible, Herr Oberst.”
Yes, quite possible. I think it’s probably a mix of the two: some made it to the West and the others escaped back into the city, as Evony attempted to do. By now they’ll be wondering who betrayed them.
The Oberst thumps his desk with his fist. “Scheisse. We’re going to look like fools when they tell their story to the Western newspapers. This is going on your permanent record, Heydrich.” He breathes hard for a moment, thinking. “What happened to your informant?”
“He…was shot, sir.”
I narrow my eyes at Heydrich, but keep my mouth shut.
“And you, Volker? Heydrich tells me you briefly appeared at the raid but then disappeared again.”
I tap the ash from my cigarette into a porcelain ashtray. “Ja. I shot one young woman who aimed a pistol at me and then left the premises chasing another.”
“What happened to her?”
I wonder if anyone’s noticed I’ve shown up with a shabby new secretary this morning. I doubt Heydrich could put two and two together and come up with four, but even idiots get lucky now and then. It’s a good thing Fräulein Hoffman is transforming her as we speak. “She got away.”
“Think you’d recognize her again? What did she look like?
I pretend to muse on this a moment. “Thirty. Red hair. Tall. I only saw her from the back.”
“Too bad.”
“Ja. Too bad.”
Heydrich and I leave the office together, the other man’s face tight with anger and humiliation. I feel my good mood swell as his plummets. There are few things I enjoy more than seeing sneaking little upstarts get their just desserts.
Schooling my face into something more professional than I feel, I ask, “So, Heydrich. What have you learned from this disaster?”
The Hauptmann flushes and mutters banalities about better preparedness.
I laugh, cutting him off. “No, no, Heydrich. What you learned is that you’re not as clever, organized or capable as you want to be. You’d like to be like me, wouldn’t you?” I give him a commiserating smile. “Some of us were only meant to advance so far, to take orders rather than give them. Try not to let it get you down. Dismissed.”
And I watch, smiling broadly, as he’s forced to salute me, his cheeks red and his eyes burning with hatred.